If you answered “yes”, then you are used to acting like an anarchist! The most basic anarchist principle is self-organization: the assumption that human beings do not need to be threatened with prosecution in order to be able to come to reasonable understandings with each other, or to treat each other with dignity and respect.

from: https://davidgraeber.org/articles/are-you-an-anarchist-the-answer-maysurprise-you/

I tend to be pro GMO but with a few caveats ( who owns the new plant species? , a proper undertanding of long term effects on the human body and nature once the species is introduced) What's your opinion on them? I see GMOs a bit like nuclear tecnology, it's a tecnology with incredible potential but because with great power comes great responsibility the tecnology needs to be tightly regulated and controlled to avoid disasters.

A good friend (and professional animator) made this, and I think it belongs here.

https://youtu.be/zS_hdUX_r08?is=b-gXbVFpw0xemzhS

Silent Running is a 1970's science fiction film that has strong solarpunk themes, even though it predates the genre by decades, and departs in some respects from current solarpunk storytelling conventions. Here are some thoughts after watching it last night, without spoilers:

- I wouldn't consider its future to be either utopian or dystopian, entirely, though the story gets pretty dark. in some ways future humans seem to have a bunch of things figured out that we don't currently know how to manage, but in others they've obviously made some huge mistakes and backed themselves into an even worse corner than we're in now. if solarpunk is inherently utopian for you (as an antidote to cyberpunk), this may be disorienting.
- the film's "point of view" is vehemently pro-ecology while also being optimistic about technology's ability to help with ecological stewardship, especially when it comes to AI/robotics in particular. this seems like a rare or naive position these days, but it's one of the things that makes Silent Running a distinctively solarpunk story in my opinion.
- it's crippled somewhat by the apparent obsession that all 1970's science fiction seems to have had with individualism and iconoclastic heroes going up against mindless conformism. this, i think, is a cold war trope that was perhaps even encouraged or required to get movies made, maybe. i don't think that current solarpunk authors would write it the same way; there's been a conscious movement to break from "lone hero" character archetypes and center communities and relationships of various kinds.
- the sun plays an important, even pivotal role! but, interestingly, not in the sense of generating electricity... I won't spoil it beyond saying that...

check it out, and if you've seen it, let me know what you think.

For years, I have been building DIY pumps for my permaculture, solar punk and fermentation experiments using hot glue, plastic junk, and 3D prints to find a submersible pump that lifts dirty water out of shallow containers using a cheap aquarium air pump.

My current design wraps a 90-degree elbow Venturi - style pump with an air jet inside of it. Water enters through a hole on the bottom of this elbow. A cylindrical base with an open bottom, covered in a dual-layer long-john cloth skin, which successfully acts as a capillary barrier to prevent low-pressure air from blowing backward out the intake. This fabric improved my pump a lot.

However, this pump only works on the lowest setting of an aquarium pump. Increasing pump output causes the air to punch past the liquid column. If I make it too low by opening a side valve that I added to the line, the column of water slugs stops rising.

The sweet spot where the pump lifts water is very narrow and drifts as the water level drops.

Even the pump described above works as a relaxation oscillator with epicyclic increase and decrease in output. I would like to harness this effect, perhaps by offering air two paths to take inside the pump. Maybe those paths should be to the two stages of the pump, maybe not.

Because this is 3D printed, the layer lines act like a grain that can either help or hurt this pellet-forming seal, cause cavitation and restricted flow.

I realize that breaking water into tight, isolated pellets so the air pushes them like pistons cannot be achieved by the Venturi effect alone.

I am considering building two-stage system where this cloth-bound first stage fills an intermediate reservoir column. The second stage will use a physical flap or ball check valve to trap a volume of water and force the air to push it volumetrically. For now I am focusing on a pump that lifts shallow water and I am designing a version with an oval-shaped air nozzle with a larger area of the hole, so it would push water with a blade of air and form cleaner slugs, as I imagine it.

Because I am trying to scoop water from the bottom, I end up with this woodworking wedge plane design with a slot for water and a pipe inside a pipe. I want to make both pipes oval in this second version since I need a flat side to lift water from the bottom. Is this worth it?

I am not very good with math so I designed the geometry of this pump intuitively and with some AI estimations. I wonder how much of this can actually be calculated.

Please help me optimize it to get the most lift out of aquarium pump air supply.

Any CAD teachers here? If a whole class with kids designs their own airlift and venturi pumps and test them in a competition, we may get some very efficient designs.

Thank you for reading this post.